Sheppard, Teyla and Ronon watched helplessly as their teammate paced his room, whipping him-self into an ever-increasing fury.

“I don’t know how you can be so calm Sheppard. These people, they’re… they’re worse than the Genii on a bad day. How you can just stand there after what they’ve done! We should be tracking them down and making them sorry they ever crossed us. I could build a bomb in an half an hour you know…”

“Rodney.” John admonished, shocked.

Without a break in his pacing McKay continued to think aloud. “Ok so a bomb is a terrible idea. Scratch that. There’s no way we could get them all together in one place without innocent civilians in the blast zone.” Stopping abruptly he snapped his fingers. “I’ve got it! We could lure them to a secure location and transport them through the Stargate.”

John rolled his eyes. “And then what, space gate them? We could get into serious trouble for that McKay.”

“Well we could… No, no. We’ll just maroon them on a deserted planet for a few years. They’ll soon learn the error of their ways. It’s a brilliant plan really. We’ll leave them tools and supplies. They’ll work together to build a community, learn the value of honest work, become responsible members of society and what-not. It’ll all be very heart warming I’m sure.” Rodney’s earnest blue eyes were wide as he waited for his teammates to acknowledge the brilliance of his plan.

Sharing a glance with Sheppard, Teyla cleared her throat and turned to smile at Rodney soothingly. “I am not familiar with these people you speak of Rodney. Are they native to the Pegasus Galaxy?”

“Then surely it is for the SGC on Earth to deal with them? Perhaps, Colonel Carter…”

Rodney flushed at Teyla’s suggestion and shuffled in sudden embarrassment. “Sam? No. Ah… Colonel Carter doesn’t understand the issue in the same way I do. She doesn’t understand how insidious these people are. How they infiltrate communities and spread hatred and poison and… and…” Rodney’s voice came to a spluttering halt as he finally ran out of steam.

“Breathe Rodney.” Sheppard took control, pushing the irate scientist into a chair and pouring him a glass of water.

Ronon pulled Sheppard aside. “McKay’s right. We should do something.”

John sighed. It was hard enough to manage Rodney’s unusual homicidal frenzy. “Ronon, we can’t kill people because McKay’s upset with them.”

“Why not?”

“Well…” Sheppard struggled to think of a reason Ronon could accept. “Considering how often someone annoys Rodney we’d be kept pretty damn busy and we’d probably have to take out the entire population of Atlantis including ourselves.”

John hustled Teyla and Ronon out of the room then turned to watch his furious lover. He resisted the urge to close his eyes to counter the dizzy sensation Rodney’s renewed restless pacing was provoking in him.

Rodney suddenly spun to face him and spoke furiously. “They’re like the Wraith. Ok, ok without the whole eating us thing. But they’re draining life force John! They’re sucking the joy and the freedom and the creativity out of people and it’s just wrong. We should be able to do something. I should be able to do something!”

“I know Rodney. I know. But the world is full of intolerant morons and we can’t kill all of them. We can’t pick and choose who deserves to live and be protected from harm. We fight for everyone’s right to life and liberty no matter how fucked-up in the head they are. They may not value individual freedom and tolerance but we do.”

“I hate being the better man.” Rodney folded his arms sulkily.

“I know.” Sheppard soothed. He reached out to rub Rodney’s shoulders. Leaning close he whispered softly. “I bet I can think of a way to make you feel better.”

Rodney smirked. “I’m sure you can.”

John’s response was a wicked grin as he lazily slid his eyes over McKay’s body. “How do you feel about some role play?”

“Ohyeah… I mean, Yes. That would be quite relaxing.” Rodney shut up and pulled Sheppard towards the bed. He was not going to start rambling again. He had much better things to do.

“Relaxing isn’t quite what I’m aiming for but it’s a start…”

- – -

Rodney leaned over the laptop furiously typing as quickly as possible. He shot furtive glances at the sleeping figure sprawled on his bed. Ok so John was right (which statistically had been bound to happen eventually) and he couldn’t kill, maim or otherwise torture countless earthlings no matter how obnoxious or hate-filled they were. He could totally rise above it and be the better man.

Checking on his favourite Slash Writer’s lj to see how she was feeling and posting a supportive message (under a false, untraceable identity) was a completely reasonable act. He felt sure John would approve. Hacking into the author’s email to find the details of the morons was strictly a precautionary measure. It was only wise to keep intel on possible enemies. It didn’t mean he was planning to do anything.

Rodney idly opened another encrypted file. This one contained a super virus he and Miko Kusanagi had perfected for use against Trust members on Earth. It was designed to get past any security system. The beauty of this particular virus was that it not only wiped out entire systems, it also destroyed all hardware and was, of course, completely untraceable.

Rodney yawned… he really shouldn’t be working on this late at night when he was exhausted. He could make all sorts of errors. Like, Ooops… Accidentally sending the virus off to everyone in the “moron” file! Gosh, how had that happened? Ah well, no point crying over melted hard drives. He may as well go back to bed.

John smiled inwardly as Rodney slipped awkwardly back into the bed obviously trying not to disturb him. John had known that once McKay recovered from his original incandescent rage his genius would kick in and he would come up with a plan which stopped short of murder, torture or kidnap. John was probably better off not knowing the exact details but knowing McKay there would be punishment to suit the crime.

Rodney slid easily into a satisfied sleep, dreaming of the anguished screams of morons all over Earth as their PCs melted…